Remember the good ol’ days of listing apartments and houses?
- Taking out a classified ad in the local newspaper to inform readers as they sip on their morning coffees.
- Posting a sign on the front lawn for cars driving by.
- Hand delivering applications to prospective renters for them to fill out either on the spot or snail mail back.
In today’s world, the above tasks are mostly handled online. Listing sites such as Craigslist, Zillow, Trulia, and Realtor have replaced newspaper ads and lawn signs. Marketing on social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter have also become increasingly popular. It makes sense. Listing and advertising a property online allows the landlord to reach a much wider audience than just counting on cars driving by or people subscribing to a certain newspaper.
Once the landlord attracts a pool of applicants, the next task is to have them submit applications. Curiously, many landlords still handle this task manually with paper applications. Online rental applications have been increasing in usage over the past few years but have not caught on nearly as fast as digital listing and marketing.
Landlords and property managers, if you are still using paper applications, here are reasons to make the switch NOW!